The above is Charlize Theron, one of the most beautiful women in the whole world.Yesterday at Macworld, Apple's Phillip Schiller announced a couple of major changes for the iTunes music store. Schiller is Apple's top marketing executive. 1) By the end of this fiscal quarter, all songs sold at the iTunes music store won't have the digital rights management (DRM) protection. What that means is if you buy a song from iTunes you can basically play it and listen to it anywhere. It will not be exclusive to your iPod. Several news stories pointed out that amazon.com has been doing this for over a year already. But it counts more with Apple, as they are by far the biggest online music store. 2) Apple is also changing their pricing structure. It use to be that all songs are 99c, no matter how new or old it is. I think it has been that way since the start of the iTunes music store, at least as long as I can remember. Now iTunes is going to offer a multi-level price structure. Songs will either be 69c, 99c, or $1.29. Apple is going to let the record companies decide the prices. With the greedy and struggling record companies deciding the prices I predict the prices will obviously skew towards the $1.29 price point. That's not really a prediction. That is based on the record companies poor choices over the years. They run their business as well as the American auto makers. Record companies suck! Now when does this new pricing change take effect? I read several news reports yesterday and I couldn't find a date.
Video of the day is Kelly Clarkson's "Because of You", an extremely heartbreaking video. Although it does end on a positive note. The ending suggests we should learn from our past so we don't keep on making the same mistakes again. The song I am definitely not sick of: Katy Perry's "I Kissed A Girl". Although I don't like most of the lyrics, this is just a great, great song.
A couple of quick movie reviews. 1) "Bolt" with voices from John Travolta and Miley Cyrus. This is a pretty good show. The hamster character is hilarious. The story is great without pandering to little kids too much. One of the most enjoyable movies I have seen with my kids. 2) "The Day The Earth Stood Still". This is your typical modern day sci-fi movie. It has some good performances and the story is okay. However I sort of had a blah feeling after leaving the theatre.
Also rollingstone.com (not rs.com) has published the cover of their next weekend, it is of George Bush. The cover article is "Bush Apologizes: The Farewell Interview We Wish He'd Give". Okay Rolling Stone I know you thought W. was a bad President, but who didn't and we get it already. Please do not put him on your cover anymore. Let him fade away. I think most people already think he was a terrible President, but let's focus on the future. Also I am about equally excited about the upcoming season of "American Idol" and the Barack Obama Presidency. I am hoping the Obama Presidency is the more successful of them both though.
One final note, I am currently reading a terrific book: Neil Stephenson's "Anathem". He can be a notoriously difficult writer to read. This book is also a bit difficult to read. If you stick with it though, there is a rhythm and you can really get into the story. However you should only pick up this book if you are willing to be challenged. Thanks to Wired Magazine for bringing this book to my attention. Also thanks to our local libraries, where I picked up my copy. themusicaddict is a huge fan of the public library system.
Have a good day, themusicaddict
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